OMG! It's finally out! I can't believe it! xD

Hopefully, you will enjoy it.

M.

PS: All the scientific stuff is the creation of my delusional mind. I do hope it makes some sense

Chapter X

March 20th, 2004

Underground Sanctuary.

Sam wasn't sure what she was feeling; she just learned she was very different from everyone else, starting with her conception as an idea rather than as a person. Holy Crap! She was engineered! By Nikola Tesla! And Dr. Magnus! And, Holy Hannah! James Watson, who was the real Sherlock. Also, put his five cents.

She huffed, she wasn't sure she was comfortable with all that knowledge. Alas, Sam wasn't sure if she was comfortable knowing she was always loved and missed by the ones she had almost accepted didn't want her in the first place.

Those things were confusing enough for someone normal, and that might be the quid of the question. She, Sam Carter wasn't your regular human being, and her biological family was comprised entirely of different kinds of strange creatures she never knew existed before!

Sam didn't know if she wanted to laugh, cry, embrace every one of them or kick them for not finding her sooner. She didn't do either, and she chose to pace. She also opted to ignore the smirk on Tesla's face when she did so or the knowing grin on Helen's face.

Putting those gestures aside, Sam also noticed that all the involved were in a situation where they didn't fully know what to do. Or how to behave with her or in front of her.

'It must be weird,' she thought, 'to tell such history to your daughters and then wait for something to happen.'

She considered that in Helen's position, she probably would have jumped to the missing daughter and embraced her. But then, she also knew herself, and as the lost kid, she wouldn't react too well to such personal contact, biological mother or not.

Scrubbing her face, Sam sighed, before stopping her pointless walk, as if that would put an end to the utter chaos in her mind. She looked at Magnus again. There was a loving expression on Helen's face: her eyes soft, a sweet smile, and an aura of understanding beyond anything Sam had felt before. And Sam wondered what kind of crap had Helen survived to be so impassively understanding, to be able to keep herself at a distance when she knew, by looking at her eyes, that Helen wanted to cocoon her in an embrace and never let her go. And then she remembered Helen had her. Them…. And she had lost them both. And she went from the cozy feeling of being loved to remember how it felt like to lose someone you loved dearly.

Helen crooked her head the moment something dawned on Sam, what did she do to cause it, she wasn't sure. Something gave when they locked eyes for the briefest of the moments.

"I don't want to pressure you, Samantha." She confessed in a whisper, "Alas, none of us will. I believe this is not the most comfortable situation for any of us; it's far from the ideal I had in my mind when I brought you to term." She smiled sadly. "What I'm attempting to explain is, we want you to feel as comfortable as you can during your stay, which I'll presume will be too short for my liking."

"Thank you," Sam managed to answer.

"Also, I assure you, all our doors are and will be opened, whenever you want to talk with us, or if you want somewhere to be where you will be unbothered. Now and having said that, we three should return to work. You can stay all the time you want," Helen smiled, and Sam gulped, there was a long time since the last time she was on such a loving glance.

Helen ushered Nikola and Ashley out of her office with a wave of her hands. "You can find tea and coffee on over there," Helen added, she winked at Sam before she too walked out. Found daughter or not; there were plenty of things to do on her day, and she was already behind.

Sam took the offer; she remained in Helen's office for a while. If she was honest, Sam felt somewhat at a loss and wanted to process it before confronting any of them.

By lunchtime, she hadn't managed quite the progress, but she couldn't avoid them forever, and she knew it. The fact that she all but disappeared from their team, added to Ashley's demeanor, provoked a deafening silent lunch. That both, Helen and Nikola were missing at the table, didn't make things smoother either.

The whole environment spoke volumes; it was evident that something occurred that morning. The not quite so subtle exchange of not quite uncomfortable but yet odd glances between the long-lost half-sisters added only more curiosity to the rest.

"I can't take this crap anymore!" Kate yelled, throwing up her fork into her plate, and standing.

"Well, join the club!" Jack added with a significant amount of disdain. Will and Daniel widened eyes showed how they didn't expect the outburst.

"Sam, what is going on?" Daniel attempted to calm the situation, "I mean, you disappeared almost all morning, and then you came for lunch and, you don't seem quite yourself, is there something wrong?" Daniel asked in concern. The millions of answers which polluted her mind were not fit for an answer she decided. Sam tried to smile, and by it, her teammates knew something was no right.

"I'm sorry guys; I'm just trying to put some things in order in my head before telling you. I will when I am ready." She answered, and they were all hanging on the words coming out that most of them failed to hear Helen joining them. Will followed her movements with his eyes, and he grinned; as she passed by, he heard throats cleared, and saw shoulders squared, the effects of her sole presence commanding respect.

"So, she knows?" Will asked once she sat next to him on a previously empty chair. He offered her a glass of pink lemonade.

"She knows more than you would think," Magnus cryptically answered. She took a sip of the drink. "Thanks, William." she smiled at him. "By any chance did you finished the profiling?"

"Profiling?" Daniel asked with a frown, his question wholly ignored by them. They seemed focused on their almost private conversation, yet the Sanctuary team knew they were more aware of their surroundings than any other person in that table.

"Yes, at least the preliminary version of it," Will grinned, they seemed concentrated in each other.

"Then, in your preliminary opinion, are they befitting?" She inquired surveying the room. Will followed her eyes movements.

"Well," Will started, licking his lips quickly, "I believe they all have a secret of their own they won't share with us. Probably a shared one which to our standards is a good sign."

"Indeed," Helen smiled.

"That they haven't divulged anything so far, makes them better fit to keep ours. They all seem mentally stable and strong-minded, along with other qualities we search in those who will access to our research."

"Have you reached a medical opinion?" he snorted. "Humor me," Helen smiled, placing a hand over his knee. "you are the second internal medical opinion." They both felt the eyes of the military team on them.

"Right. I've checked medical results as they appeared in my board," Will pointed, affirming with it that he hadn't seen Sam's records. "As you may have already concluded, there's nothing in those records that would make them seekers of our truth by themselves."

"Thank you, Will. To answer your question, Doctor Jackson, yes. You were all analyzed and evaluated. It started the moment you reached our facility, as it's part of our safety protocols. It is of absolute importance for us to protect not only our interests but the interest of those under our protection."

"And you haven't notified us about it?"

"Teal'c and Doctor Frasier were advised about the preliminary medical scans," Helen pointed. "Doctor Frasier being the only one of you who could deny such procedure and thus, she wouldn't be here. Or did Nikola failed to mention it?"

"No, he was very opened about tests and evaluations to be done."

"Very well then, don't be alarmed by it. The results of your evaluation show that none of you would normally try and search our truth, and there's nothing wrong with that. Now, with the issue that you do have and which brought you here: Given the extent of your injuries and the common treatment for the toxin you were exposed, you will be here with us for a couple more days."

"Are we?" Colonel O'Neill asked bitterly.

"Yes, Colonel. The source of your treatment can't leave this building, and the healing process does need the supervision of someone who at least has seen the evolution of the treatment. Rest assured you are all in excellent conditions and this experience won't affect any future you will have."

"Still we are half prisoners here," Jack pointed. Helen snorted.

"You aren't prisoners. However, our residents are overly cautious due to your presence. Therefore, given the little facts surrounding you and the eagerness of our residents to return to their regular days. I am willing to open our proverbial doors," I say, and I feel Will's eyes on me, I give his tight a light squeeze, and he is back to analyzing them.

"What's the catch?"Daniel asks frowning.

"The only thing we will ask in return is for you to be quiet about what you will learn. If you agree to keep this information to yourselves, then I shall find you in my office in four hours. The decision is ultimately yours; now I have things to tend to, William, find me in two hours please," with that, she walked out of the room, again.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Jack questioned loudly, and as an answer, the Sanctuary team shrugged. "Oh! Don't give me that crap! I know you know whatever she wanted to say. Spill it."

"We can't do such thing," Ashley answered before she too stood up. "You guys know where to find me if you need me," she excused herself. Sam followed suit and was surprised when she noticed Ashley had stopped for her.

"I want to know you," Ashley started. "It's so cool for me to know you are alive," she grinned. "I would love to know who you are, but I do have some issues which came from my time under the Cabal influence. And I need to go. You will find mom in her room at the moment; she always goes for a bath at midday," she smiled.

"A bath?"

"Oh, yeah. Mom is weird! And here, you can have mine; I won't use it until I'm back to myself hopefully in a few hours. I've marked mom's room for you. Good luck!" she smiled, giving her the 7-inch tablet she had stored somewhere in herself. "Back pouch, mom made it for me," she grinned. Then, turned around to check they were alone. "Ah, please don't freak out?" she frowned worriedly. "I really, really need to go now."

"Why would I freak…" and then in a blink, Ashley disappeared. "Oh, that," she completed for her sake only. She stood there, looking at the space in which Ashley just was, she probably would have been more scared if she wasn't acquainted with the Asgard beam, and yet again, that needed some well-thought tech, and Ashley was only a girl.

She stood taller when she felt was being watched; then she felt someone joining her. It was Jack, she could tell by the way her body reacted to his presence.

"Carter?" he asked, looking at her as if she just lost it. And really, he wasn't that much off the mark. "Are you okay?" The concern he felt easily noticed in both questions. She nodded once, "Why are you here?"

"I needed some air," she smiled at him, trying not to sound too disappointingly fake.

"Okay, do you need me to walk with you?" He asked cautiously, noticing as he did before his Carter was in a funny mood. Sam looked at him and wondered if she should tell him what had transpired that morning, but if she was grasping straws on that one, how could she ask him to give her support? She just shook her head.

"I know where I am going," she told him, and for once, since their exchange started, he knew she wasn't lying to him.

"Good. You know you can tell me, us, anything, right?"

"Yeah. I know. Thanks, Jack," she finished, blushing when she noticed the emphasis on his name and then, she turned around on her heels and started to follow the map in her hands.

Once she left that corridor, and Jack's unwavering eyes, Sam checked the map and saw the room was far away enough to give her time to put herself together. She took every step carefully, having plenty to wrap her head around and then, she was in the residential area, and found it empty. She started to talk to herself, as she often did when she wanted to dissect information for her understanding.

"Let's see, I'm the daughter of two people who made themselves abnormals for the greater good," she whispered. "Yes, I can deal with that; it's just biology. It doesn't make me any different than I already am, right?" She said, stopping to hit her head on the first window she saw. Her mind told her something was off out there, but she dismissed it with her next thought and some more walk.

"It shouldn't matter that your father is *the* Tesla and he's over 100 years now. Nope, that's nothing given that your mom is over 200 and your older sister is younger than you, and she can disappear out into thin air! Yup! That makes so much sense," she scrubbed her face, "how am I supposed to be comfortable with this?" She whined to herself.

And then, she was in front of the doors that appeared as 'Magnus' in Ashley's map. Her mother's room. She knocked, and there was no answer. She considered turning around and walking back somewhere else that seemed attractive on the map, but then, she tried the door, and it opened.

Helen was a bath kind of woman, but today she needed the full force of the stream to calm her tense muscles, her body turning on a bright red due to the strength and temperature of the water.

Over the noise of the shower, the alarm Henry had created to avoid finding Will and her in an inappropriate situation for him to watch, sounded announcing that someone had opened her door. Getting out of the shower, she started to dry herself, thinking it was Will wanting to know what had happened that day.

Sam crossed the threshold slowly and entered the room. She saw a seating area, a library, and a fireplace. But nothing to point to a bedroom or a shower. Then she noticed the hidden door and knocked it adding a "Hello?"

Inside the room, Sam's voice vibrated, making Helen's heart flutter, answering aloud, "come on in." Before it hit her: There was no way she could put her makeup on without Sam seeing her real face, her actual physical age in the unforgiving light of her room. She wouldn't have the chance she had the previous night to try and hide it in the well-known shadows of the building.

"Bloody hell!" she muttered. "I'll be there in a minute!" Helen added, and her years of experience allowed her to dress in record time. With her hair wrapped in her towel, she went out, and consequences be damned. "How can I help you, Sam?" she asked softly, coming out of the dressing room toweling her hair dry.

"Sorry, I. I don't know why I came," she grimaced. "Ashley mentioned you would be here now," Sam trailed looking all around the room except to Helen.

"I try to take some time for myself, and as I always feel more relaxed after a bath or shower, " she trailed as Sam finally stopped looking around and saw her.

"Whoa! Now that I see you in this light, I don't know how I'll manage to make myself believe you are my biological mother. It's amazing, you don't look older than twenty-five," she trailed, making Helen smile. "I look older than you!" she added, and Helen stopped her movements altogether. She frowned and lowered her towel, and then, she came closer to Sam, watching her straight in the eyes.

"Is that what you feel? Or is that fear speaking?" She inquired with a bit of curiosity and a lot of guilt. Sam nodded a bit ashamed, Helen sighed. "Oh, Samantha, I look myself in the mirror every single day, looking for a change. Looking for something to point me that I am still aging, that my exterior is changing to reflect what I've gone through, to show how much I've lived. However, every day, I get the same reflection, the same face you see now, and then, I cover it under an excessive amount of makeup. Judging from the day we've found you, that's something you don't do. You don't cover your face, nor you see the need to do it. Therefore, I'll make a wild guess and say you don't look yourself in the mirror often, am I correct?" She asked, and Sam didn't know if it was Helen's soft, loving eyes, or the way her words sounded so truth in her ears, or maybe it was merely that she was right.

"I don't want to see me aging," she whined. "I'm not the prettiest of them all, and I don't have a job that requires me to go all hair and makeup and with a fancy suit. So, I don't, I don't pay attention to my looks if I can avoid it. How did you know?"

"I have experience with what you feel." She smiled self-deprecatingly.

"Yeah, right," escaped Sam's mouth before she could stop herself.

"Yes, it happened to me around the date when I injected myself with the serum. I, like many people, wanted to be forever young to be able to help as many beings I could. But years kept passing by me without having a way to control it. I changed, but I wouldn't stop thinking about it unless I was busy. I moved from site to site helping around, and I only checked the mirror every once in a while, I didn't want to age, but I wasn't paying attention to myself then, not until Nikola and John pointed it out." I smile. "You, like me back then, haven't noticed it because no one ever showed it to you. Here, take a look," Helen said, passing her a hand-held mirror.

"I don't get it." She added with a frown, lowering it again.

"Come," Helen said, grabbing her by the hand and leading her to the full-length mirror in her dressing room. "Look at yourself and think about how old you think you look. Then, look at me, really look at me, like this, with no covers on, and not hiding in the shades, and pray tell whatever makes you believe I looked any younger than you?"

Sam looked and herself, then at Magnus, and then she did a double-take, surprised when she found she looked somewhat younger than Helen did.

"I don't get it; how is this even possible? I'm thirty-five years old, and you don't look a day older than twenty-five. How could I think I look younger than you?" Sam frowned, Helen smiled at her lovingly.

"That one I can answer," she added, placing a lock of hair behind Sam's ear, "you thought you looked older because you had no one to compare. I haven't met your mother, the woman who raised you, but she probably doesn't look quite young."

"My mom died when I was thirteen."

"I'm sorry, growing up without a mother is a tragedy."

"It can be. But what does it have to do with this?" Sam asked, waving in front of her face.

"The mind is a very complex thing, and it can play tricks on us. It can make us see something in which we believe as if it was real. Ashley didn't stop aging until," she bit her lower lip, "when they made her dormant genes active. She was worried that by the time she turned thirty, I would look like her younger sister." Helen smiled, "Now, you. Your genes were active the whole time. Based on history, I will say your aging started to decrease by the time you were sixteen and fully stopped around twenty-two, that's when it's believed an Akhkharu's body reached the full development."

"Am I abnormal?" she asked, biting her lower lip.

"For your current mental state," Helen trailed, biting her lower lip, "I wish I could deny it. I wish I could tell you that I was mistaken and you aren't who you are. I wish I could inform you that everything you believed in before meeting me is the truth. I wish I could say your biological family background won't affect you if in the I can't. You are Nikola's and my daughter, and you are Ashley's half-sister. You are not only beautiful but a powerful abnormal. And sadly, for some, you will be considered a threat to humankind."

"I was afraid you would answer that," she sighed.

"I know, and can't blame you for feeling that way. I can only hope that someday, you will find in you the forgiveness that I don't deserve. I can't nor will forgive myself for losing you in the first place," she winced, and once again, Sam found herself knowing those words were true. Then, Helen smiled and caressed her cheeks in a ghostly touch effectively calming her need to flee. "This is not about me and how I feel. It is about you; I can't change what happened, I couldn't change it when I relived it. I can only accept that, whatever it happens from now on, it's in your hands. And you must understand that, whatever you choose, I'll take. We all will, even if that means I will lose you for good."

"I don't know what to say."

"You don't need to say anything; you need to know that I've loved you that much. That I, we, love you enough to let you go, to let you be whoever you want to be and even if I can give you much more than that, I know that's not what you need now," Helen smiled sadly, and then, she gasped for air when Sam placed a small kiss on her cheek.

"Thank you," Sam whispered. A beat passed, and Sam saw part of Magnus walls beginning to reconstruct themselves, in a way she was quite familiar.

"Now, I need to get ready for the rest of my day. I'm quite confident your friends will be shocked if I appear like this, and I will probably scare half of my personal. You are welcomed to stay and asks as many questions as you want."

They left her room around an hour later, after she covered her face with a dexterity won over the years, and answered as many questions as they could fit during that time.

She had asked William for a meeting, and they had one scheduled after that. And Helen knew that if she took more than her standard allotted siesta time, someone was bound to come up and check what was happening with her. It was also strategical; the moment was very intimate and left her a lot more vulnerable than she liked to feel around people she should be guiding.

"Oh, I must confess something," she didn't know quite to pose her confession, it sounded rather cheesy, "I've made a promise to Will when he rejoined my team, and I try to honor it."

"What kind of promise?" Sam asked out of curiosity.

"He asked me to try and avoid keeping secrets from him."

"And you are telling me this because?"

"I understand you might not be comfortable telling your teammates about your origins. However, not only because of the promise but because I do respect him as a friend and as my partner, I will let Will know about you."

"Oh, if you must," she sounded a bit disappointed. Helen stopped walking and turned to look at her.

"I don't want to walk on eggshells around you or anyone for that matter. However, even if I feel I must tread carefully with you, I also respect you to let you know William will know it with or without your full consent."

"Thanks, I guess," she added before the silence took over for a couple of meters. Then, Sam cleared her throat.

"I. I saw Ashley disappear in front of my eyes," Sam confessed. She didn't know if she should be surprised, scared, or just freaking out over that information. However, Helen looked at her from the corner of her eyes.

"Ah, that. Was Ashley in a hurry?" Sam nodded. "The ability to demolecularize herself comes from her father. It was part of her dormant genes." She explained and Sam made an O with her mouth, recalling what she learned about Ashley's genetical situation. Then she studied the answer and stopped dead in her tracks. Helen turned around to see what happened to her.

"So, she demolecularizes herself?" She inquired, looking exactly like Nikola did when they learned about John's skills. She could see Sam's mind working on the details and in the theories that such kind of affirmations brought out to the light. And she smiled, after all, she had been there too.

"Yes, that's the name we gave it. It is a rather complex theory; part of the quantum theories developed because of her father's ability to do the same. What they can do is, imagine a place and transport themselves to it by disarming their structure, becoming energy in the purest form and rearming themselves on the other place. Exchanging their energy form with the energy form on the other side, they do have the ability to do the same to people they are holding. However, even if the skill comes handy, there are ways to contain them."

"Whoa!"

"Ashley's skills are more advanced than John's; we needed a new containment form since EM shields did nothing for her."

"What about her father?"

"He," her voice broke a little, "He's deceased. Or we presume he is, in his attempt to save me, and my attempt to preserve the current reality, I lost track of him; we found nothing to point out that he came out alive of there. The structure of the place was not suitable for teleportation. If he remained where I had last seen him, he wouldn't survive the explosion."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be, most of my life I've seen people I love disappearing, being just an act like Nikola's. Or for good as many of my friends and colleagues. It's not easy, but when I meet someone. I also know, chances are I will lose them sooner or later," she added sadly, and Sam gulped. "It is part of who I am."

Sam knew how it was to lose someone, her mom, colleagues, and then Daniel, who had always found a way to come back. But she couldn't imagine what it could be like to meet people every year and lose them while you remain looking the same way.

"Will should be here at any moment, feel free to roam my library, you might find something you like. I do have some work to do. When he arrives, you can remain in here if you desire so."

Sam perused the library and found a good number of books that had perked her imagination. But she decided she should do some background checking on vampires. And she sat in the armchair in Helen's office reading about them. The real history, not the bloodsucking, garlic eaters' vampires. And Helen couldn't avoid but feel a little happier knowing she hadn't made her daughter fly away from her. Not yet, at least.